Come to the Dark Side
by hippiechick2112
Summary: Instead of musing over his past escape and Section Eight failures, Klinger has cooked up another scheme to get back to Toledo. This time, though, he's got to make his story believable and the route a success. Part seven of "The Klinger Chronicles".


**Come to the Dark Side**

**Note and Disclaimer: Obviously, I don't own the storylines and characters of M*A*S*H (as always, we all wish we did) and write silly stories, just like everyone else here.**

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It's taken me weeks since becoming company clerk of this hellhole, but I think that I got all of the Chinese words down pat, this enemy uniform up-to-date and perfect and evidence that I was somebody else. I think I'm ready for the big show and to prove, once and for all, that I am a nutcase that needs to be freed.

That's right. This is Corporal Maxwell Q. Klinger, situated at the 4077th M*A*S*H, coming in to broadcast live, to tell you about the latest "Get Home to Toledo" scheme. And this time, I think it'll be brilliant, better than the other schemes I've cooked up! The others here won't know what was coming at them. I'll be trolling down the streets of Toledo in no time flat!

Of course, nobody might believe that I was a Chinese spy, hiding a secret uniform within the Klinger Collection and was transmitting secret information to the enemy for the time I've been here…or that, perhaps, I had been a woman and was changed into a man, for real this time. And being a man in women's clothing had been me feel right at home once more.

My escape route has been planned already, just in case they all want to tag me for treason. Just before the M.P.'s could come for me, I would be out of this village in no time flat. I could catch a ride from Kimpo to Tokyo, Tokyo to Guam, Guam to San Francisco and then San Francisco to home, Toledo!

And Soon Lee had helped me with this escape route home, so nothing could get me back to being the company clerk again, the one so underappreciated that even Radar would swoon to hear about the shallowness of the camp. However, back to this interesting Korean woman…I knew that she, Soon Lee, would do almost anything for me after all I've been helping her and her fellow villagers with. In return, she was more than willing to track down old pathways to Kimpo and follow up on flight schedules.

And I can always go the Klinger style, holding onto the bottom of the plane tightly. It'll be like old times, when I was proposing to Eisenhower and wore my wedding dress in Tokyo. Of course, I won't be grounded to my tent for weeks, with the threat of my dresses being turned into ash and shipped to the enemy. This time, I would be free as a bird!

"Oh, Klinger, when are you going to learn? You're not going to get out of here unless you serve your time and you won't be on the run all the time."

Oops, there's Captain Hunnicutt with our Chief of Chiefs, Colonel Potter, right behind him. While Captain Hunnicutt is explaining to me (once again) about how terrible I've been with the escape attempts and the Section Eight antics, Colonel Potter is oddly quiet. I ignore Captain Hunnicutt, but study our Chief until he suddenly turns red, interrupting the captain as I stare him down with my most vicious face.

"Klinger, in my office…NOW!" Colonel Potter yelled, making Captain Hunnicutt even cringe.

I said in Chinese, "If I must."

"Knock it off, Klinger, or I'll be sending more than the Klinger Collection in ashes to the North Koreans!"

"Colonel, if I may butt in here," Captain Hunnicutt replied, almost in my defense. "If I heard what Klinger said correctly, I think he said something in Chinese. I don't know what exactly he said, but he's learned something new since his last escape attempt and it has nothing to do with staying in camp."

"That's right," I added in English, for good measure, defiantly not going into the office as I was ordered to. "I am part Chinese and North Korean, Sirs. One parent was Chinese and the other was North Korean. I was raised Communist and am fighting you Imperialist dogs. And if I may also say, I've been spying and sending up information to the enemy for quite some time now. And even I've been surgically altered, from a man to a woman, to throw off everyone's trail."

Captain Hunnicutt and Colonel Potter only exchanged confused looks, as if asking each other if they heard what the other just heard. Then, both of them started snickering and then laughing at me and it was very loud, so that everyone in Post-Op could hear it. They were laughing at me, the genius that I have been and always will be!

_How dare they!_

"Oh, Klinger, that's about the most ridiculous joke you've made up since I've been here in Korea!" Captain Hunnicutt said, through his tears of laughter.

Even Colonel Potter's anger and rage was down to a minimum. "Klinger, that's about the most creative Section Eight attempt I've ever heard of, even if you are a war behind. This is almost as good as you playing voodoo with a replica doll of me!"

"You _dare_ insult the master Chinese/North Korean spy?" I asked, insulted that nobody believed me…still. However, I thought it more appropriate to be insulted over not being…well, believed.

"You're too hairy to be a Chinese or North Korean woman spy, Klinger." Captain Hunnicutt pointed out, continuing to laugh. "Besides, you're too much of a genius to be going to the dark side of things."

"Dark side?" I was confused, forgetting to switch back to Chinese.

Captain Hunnicutt stopped laughing for a moment, but I was sure that he was going to start up again, anytime soon (and surely tell Captain Pierce so that I would get teased later). "Face it, Klinger. Even the enemy can't deal with you. If they had someone like you, they'd either use you to their advantage or shoot you for being smarter than they are."

"And since I can't shoot you like a sick horse, I'll be using you to my advantage." Colonel Potter had stopped his own merriment and his eyes were shining, which was a sign of trouble for me and I knew it. "Klinger, you're now grounded to this here office for the rest of the war and afterward, if I can help it. Unless you can show me that you won't be escaping for a while, then I suggest you start getting used to Mess Tent food in this office and hanging your cheese and garlic someplace else."

As Colonel Potter pointed to the new packages from my mother with all the food under my cot (smelly, for sure), I became indignant, forgetting my new role as the Communist spy. "Those, _Sir_, are gifts from my mother."

"Then, you better get them packing," Colonel Potter replied. "And take off that enemy uniform before you really get shot! Don't be going to any dark side and that's an order!"

"Yes, Sir," I could only say, defeated as I started disassembling the uniform and evidence of tm deceit.

And yet…yet, I knew that this was not the end. Escape number…one hundred and something, I believe, may two hundred and something…had been foiled, but the Klinger Plan to go home to Toledo was yet to be completely done with. I will go home and Toledo it shall be!


End file.
